


I made the earth remember him

by brinnanza



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Gen, Grief/Mourning, basically My Thoughts disguised as Caduceus's Thoughts, takes place circa those two weeks in zadash, the various healthy or unhealthy ways people deal with grief in the long term
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-21 17:30:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17047508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brinnanza/pseuds/brinnanza
Summary: Days turn to weeks, and Caduceus sees more grief than he ever has, a constant echo of loss from his new friends. He watches and he listens and he learns how each of them wears it, how it becomes a part of them. Before the Mighty Nein, outside of his family, he’d only ever seen moments, brief glimpses with no larger context. It is, as many things prove to be, a valuable learning experience.





	I made the earth remember him

**Author's Note:**

> hoo boy this is my High Concept Character Piece. most of these Thoughts are My Thoughts because caduceus "wisdom of 20" sees all, but they are colored slightly by cad's pov, so if you think I'm reading someone wrong That's Just What Cad Thinks.
> 
> as it says in the tags, this takes place after cad has been with the nein for a few weeks but before they meet up with yasha in nicodranas. it's all pretty nebulous re: time setting, but with ashley being gone so much, I don't really have a good handle on how yasha has been dealing with stuff, so that's why her section is Like That
> 
> thanks to glorya for looking this over for me. the title is, of course, courtesy of taliesin jaffe in episode 2x30 the journey home.

In Caduceus’s experience, everyone is grieving something.

Most of the people he meets in his youth are grieving lost family or friends, as one might expect of visitors to the Blooming Grove. They bury their loved ones or come to call on them, to sip tea the Wildmother grew from their losses and remember. For many years, Caduceus witnesses a variety of grief, comforts where he can and listens when he cannot. He is young and bathed in the constant warmth of the Wildmother, and grief does not yet touch his heart.

And then the forest grows ill.

One by one, Caduceus’s family leaves the temple behind in search of a cure, and though they trust the Wildmother, they still grieve their ailing home, their left-behind children and sisters and brothers and parents. Caduceus misses them fiercely but knows they will return if the Wildmother wills it, so he does not mourn them, not yet. 

He travels to town for provisions, meets people grieving friends and freedom and honesty; he chases off bandits grieving security and home. He waits and waits for a sign until the fractured party that calls themselves the Mighty Nein comes to his temple, and they are grieving.

Everyone’s grieving something, but the people he follows out of his forest and into the Empire are grieving everything. The one they lost sounds like quite a colorful fellow, and Caduceus would have quite liked to meet him, but then, perceptions always shift with death. People have their sharp edges rounded off, sanded down until they’re as smooth as polished stone. And that’s all right. How the living remember the dead makes no difference to the dead.

Days turn to weeks, and Caduceus sees more grief than he ever has, a constant echo of loss from his new friends. He watches and he listens and he learns how each of them wears it, how it becomes a part of them. Before the Mighty Nein, outside of his family, he’d only ever seen moments, brief glimpses with no larger context. It is, as many things prove to be, a valuable learning experience.

Nott, Caduceus learns, wears her grief on her sleeve. She stitches in into her clothes, paints it on her skin, ties it into her hair and looks at it as often as she can bear until she gets used to the sight of it. It becomes a part of her. Not indelible, like her eyes or her teeth, but like her jewelry and her bandages. It’s something she chooses to keep, something that will change her, for better or for worse.

Caleb wears his grief like plate armor, a defense and a warning all at once. It keeps people away, keeps him safe locked up inside, but nothing can touch him. It’s heavier than he can carry alone and each step is a struggle, driving him to the ground again and again. It may make him strong, but more likely it will just run him ragged, and if he doesn’t lighten the load, he will be crushed by it.

Beau’s grief is like ink in her cupped hands, something poured upon her that she tries to contain. She wants to hold onto it, wants to absorb all of it through her skin and remember it always, but it leaks out through her fingers. It fades and fades until her hands are empty, but the skin is left stained. She is changed by it, irrevocably, even when she closes her hands into fists and hides the stain from the world.

Fjord’s grief is glass, a fragile thing he tries to destroy by crushing it in his own hand. It shatters, jagged pieces falling away until his hands look unburdened once again, but his palms are sliced to ribbons, dripping blood onto the grass below his feet, bright red against green. He can wash away the blood, bandage the cuts, but unless he takes the time to delicately remove every lingering shard of glass that pierces his skin, it will never truly heal. It will leave behind a scar either way, but with enough care, it can be soft and faded pink rather than raised and red and angry.

Jester paints her grief with brilliant hues, covers a moldering canvas with a riot of colors. She’s a skilled artist, and no one can see the base disintegrating beneath the facade. Layer by layer, she adds to her artwork, building herself up into something that looks solid even as the canvas flakes away and leaves her hollow. With enough paint, enough layers, it may stand on its own, but there will come a time when the whole thing shatters into dust, and she will have to start over. 

Caduceus had only gotten a glimpse of Yasha’s grief, how she’d channeled all of her pain and rage into a primal scream, how she’d immediately set out after the storm wrought by her anguish. Would she bury it deep in her heart, feel it rumble like thunder in her chest with every step? Perhaps it will crackle like lightning within her, lashing out and striking at random or fall on her like a constant rain she can never shelter herself from. Perhaps none of these, or all of them.

It is difficult to know what grief looks like on you from the inside, but Caduceus himself is no exception. He never met Mollymauk, did not lose him, but he has things to grieve all the same, his family and his forest and the constant presence of the Wildmother. He has seen enough grief in other people to have some idea of how he wears it.

Caduceus invites his grief in, plants it next to his heart and tends to it carefully, coaxing it into something beautiful. Sometimes it blooms, vibrant and alive and new. Sometimes it withers and dies before it can grow, but it enriches the soil below for the next seed that is sown there. And sometimes, if there’s not enough sun, if he plants too many seeds without regard for balance, if he lets the field grow wild, twisted, thorny vines will creep across the garden, choking out all life. It will twine around his heart, piercing him with every breath until the earth lies fallow. 

But Caduceus knows grief, and he knows gardens. He doesn’t know much of the world, doesn’t know what he might have to plant within him as his journey goes on, but he trusts the Wildmother. He will do what he has always done, comfort and listen and make tea. He will tend the garden in his heart and he will follow the Wildmother’s path.

Caduceus does not know what lays in store for him, but he can’t wait to tend what grows.


End file.
